Abstract

The Missouri Ozark Forest Ecosystem Project (MOFEP), which was started in 1989 by the Missouri Department of Conservation, evaluates the effects of forest management practices (even-aged management, uneven-aged management, and no-harvest management) on upland oak-forest components in southern Missouri. MOFEP is a long-term, landscape-level, fully replicated, and multidisciplinary project. More than 30 studies have been implemented in MOFEP. Integration of ecosystem studies has been encouraged since MOFEP was initiated to better understand how diff erent ecosystem components interact with each other. Integration ensures that resource managers also base their decisions for improving resource management on results from a multidisciplinary research process rather than from single disciplinary studies. For MOFEP, the term "integration" has not been well defined and we offer a working definition of integration to facilitate communication and mutual understanding of the term. We provide an overview of progress made thus far and discuss challenges that need to be addressed to make integration more efficient and effective.